


Bad puns and phone conversations

by Captain_Snark



Series: The valentine debacle [4]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: (or maybe it is), I should feel ashamed is what I'm trying to say, M/M, There's so many puns, so many bad ones, someone should tell the Snart siblings that puns are maybe not the best flirting technique, the valentine debacle continues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2016-04-05
Packaged: 2018-05-31 10:47:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6467248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Captain_Snark/pseuds/Captain_Snark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After recieving a text message that Barry refuses to believe is from Snart, Iris and Cisco are hell-bent on calling the unknown number. Both Lisa and Len seem hell-bent on filling the phone conversation with as many bad puns as physically possible.</p>
<p>In which Barry contemplates why the ground does not just open up to swallow him whole.</p>
<p>(A continuation of my valentine fic from months ago)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bad puns and phone conversations

**Author's Note:**

> For some reason this was so hard to write, hence the long wait. I should just not be allowed to write things that consist out of more than one chapter. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy and thanks for reading!

Within seconds the whole team is standing around Cisco and staring at the text, minus Harry who proclaims they’re all making too big of a deal out of this. Barry is probably the only one to agree as everyone rereads that text over and over again.

_You into speed dating? Because you can speed that ass over here in the next five minutes._

Barry hopes the floor will open up and swallow him whole. After a minute it is clear he has no such luck and everyone is now staring at him. As if Barry possibly has an explanation for this whole thing. He doesn’t. Which is the problem.

“First of all,” Barry starts, as if he’s got a second or a third of all to follow up with. But the silence is starting to drive him crazy and he has to say something. “You don’t know if that text’s from Snart.”

The fact that nobody says anything, tells him that was not the right thing to say. Everyone seems to be questioning his sanity at this point and Iris is giving him her famous _‘Barry Allen you are an idiot’_ look. It’s the same look Joe would give him and Barry is sure that Iris’s grandparents and their grandparents are also masters of that same look.

Barry is well aware that this would be a great time to say ‘Second of all, yet what follows is not something he is very proud of. Maybe Iris was right to give him one of the famous West family stares.

“What? You don’t! That’s an unknown number, it could be anyone!” Barry exclaims, a little shrill, gesturing wildly with his arms at the phone. Because gesturing wildly is definitely what’s going to get him out of this situation.

“For real?” Cisco questions. Barry would really like to repeat that sentiment, because there is just no way this is happening to him. He so does not deserve the idiot look from Iris.

“Fine, if it’s not Cold, then call the number,” Iris says.

Barry isn’t sure when Iris lost her mind in the last five minutes, but she has officially gone mad. He hopes his facial expression clearly tells her so, because his jaw is about halfway to China.

“I’m not calling.”

She regards him for a second, a calculating look in her eye. “So it is Cold’s number,” she says then, in that way Joe says things when he’s cracked a case.

“It’s not.”

“Then call it.”

“I’m not calling.”

Iris opens her mouth to reply when Cisco clears his throat, giving both Iris and Barry pointed looks before they can start arguing like four year olds. “Not to interrupt or anything, but I’m just going to call now,” he tells them, phone already at his ear.

The whole of Team Flash officially no longer has a right to call Barry an idiot, because this is probably the stupidest idea Iris and Cisco have ever had. Except for maybe that time Cisco thought drones and lasers make great training exercises. Which is beside the point.

“Cisco, give me the phone,” Barry demands, his voice sounding slightly more panicked than he would have liked.

Cisco, not surprisingly, refuses to give him the phone. It’s too bad for Cisco that Barry literally has superpowers and the phone is out of his hands in 0.1 seconds flat.

He looks a little too surprised for someone who’s been helping measure Barry’s speed ever since he got out of his coma. Apparently people never really get used to things disappearing out of their hands without actually seeing it happen.

“What the… Okay, there has got to be some rule that prevents you from doing that. I’m pretty sure it’s abuse of power,” Cisco tells him when he notes that Barry is once again the proud owner of his own phone.

He’s about to reply when his phone stops dialling and he hears a familiar female voice on the other end. Barry isn’t sure whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, because now he’s talking to Lisa and he is not sure which Snart sibling is actually the one to look out for most. 

“Why, Flash, how kind of you to call so fast,” Lisa’s voice takes on a slight drawl on the final word in true Snart fashion. “In fact, you should never keep a lady waiting.”

It’s ironic that the cold gun or Captain Cold are nowhere in sight, as Barry is basically frozen in place. He has no idea what to actually say or do as Lisa continues.

“I got to say, it was quite a surprise when you dropped by on valentine. A shame it was such a quick visit, really. And I thought my brother was the cold one. You could have at least stayed for dinner. Lenny’s a surprisingly good cook.”

Barry inwardly groans at the puns. Of course Lisa also talked in constant puns, it seemed to be the Snart equivalent of how the Wests talked in stares that made you feel stupid. Which is great, because apparently everyone has family traits that are the bane of his existence.

“Lisa?” He’s sure he sounds about as confused as everyone else in the room looks when he says her name. Apparently, Lisa answering the phone was not the development anyone expected.

“That would be me, yes. For someone so fast, you’re pretty slow on the uptake, Flash.”

This time he can’t help the groan from escaping him at yet another pun. Lisa on the other hand apparently thinks it’s hilarious. Barry might have like the puns more if this whole thing wasn’t about to blow up in his face.

“Do you have to make a pun every other sentence?” he asks.

“What can I say? Puns run in the family.” There’s a pause and Barry has about two seconds to brace himself for what he knows is coming. “But you know all about running, don’t you, Flash?”

Cisco’s face brightens with glee and Barry’s pretty sure he would have high-fived Lisa if she’d been there with them. Of course Cisco likes puns as much as he likes making up names for supervillains. Both are a kind of wordplay after all, he should have known.

Even Iris is trying to stifle her laughter. Barry on the other hand is finding it very hard to see the humour as less than ten minutes ago he was getting lectured on fraternizing with the enemy while now they’re all laughing at Lisa’s puns. Or maybe they’re laughing at Barry’s misery. Both are probable at this point.

He is still in the middle of deciding whether having Lisa answer the phone is turning out to be a good thing or a bad thing when her voice is cut off and replaced by her brother’s.

“You’ll have to excuse my sister,” Snart says and his voice does that thing where Barry knows whatever comes next is another ridiculous pun. “She isn’t quite up to speed with the fact that she’s actually not supposed to be flirting.”

He’s pretty sure he hears Lisa yelling in the background that _‘someone has to do it’_ and he’s also pretty sure his face is as white as a sheet of paper.

“Meaningyouare?”

The words are out of his mouth before Barry can think about it and he’s pretty sure there was some super speed involved. Yet the fact that Cisco and Iris have now both gone back to looking at him in complete shock, tells him it wasn’t fast enough to not be understood. Caitlin looks as if Barry has just jumped headfirst into a fight with a dangerous metahuman without a plan. Harry on the other hand doesn’t seem worried as much as he seems annoyed that none of them are doing something productive.

Barry’s not sure whose sentiment he agrees with more. He's still kind of hoping for the ground to open up beneath his feet.

-

The words kind of blur together, but Len realizes just what he said and implied when Barry replies. Lisa still listening in to the conversation right next to him isn’t helping either. He supposes he’s lucky that at least Mick has a sense of personal space and is observing the whole thing from a few feet away.

He has no idea what to say. The thing is Len has never really thought about whether or not he was actually flirting with Barry. There has been banter, sure, but he’s not sure how much of that banter was purely banter. Apparently at this point, neither is Barry.

Len isn’t one for taking risks and not having a plan. He likes to think things through, know all the possible outcomes. How things can go wrong and what he can do to avoid things from going wrong. But what he’s about to say is not calculated, not planned out from a to z. 

He has no idea how Barry is going to react and maybe Lisa’s pushing has gotten to him. He needs someone to blame and he’s blaming both Barry and Lisa for this. And maybe Mick, because Mick has a tendency to make things blow up in Len’s face. (No offense to Mick, Len wouldn’t really trust anyone else to be his partner.)

“Have you seen yourself in that suit, Scarlet?” he drawls and he swears he can hear Barry blush through the phone, as well as other people gasping in shock. Good to know being a hero doesn’t exclude you from people listening in on your phone conversations.

“I… what… no… I mean yes… I mean what are you… I don’t…” Barry stammers on the other end, probably flushing 50 shades of red. Which is not a reference Len is proud of having made, so he interrupts Barry before that thought can go anywhere.

“Lisa did have the right idea though. Next time you drop by, feel free to stay for dinner.”

“Dinner?” Barry repeats as if it’s a new word he just learned and he’s still not sure on what it means.

“Yes, dinner,” Len repeats. “Do you want to have dinner?”

“I err…” Barry starts when suddenly there’s the sound of a struggle.

There’s a female voice demanding what the hell Barry thinks he’s doing and a male voice sounding decidedly shocked when the person asks if they’re dreaming. A second female voice is demanding Barry give her the phone, because she is going to have a talk with him.

Surprisingly there’s also a male voice telling them all to calm down and that he does not see what the big deal is. Len has no idea who this man is and he’s kind of curious.

There’s more yelling and then whispering as they realise he can hear everything they’re saying when it sounds like Barry’s going through a tunnel. It doesn’t last long, however, and five seconds later Barry’s voice is back on the other end without people yelling in the background.

“Sorry, I err… had to find some place without all the… you know,” Barry apologizes.

“I suppose the use of super speed is not limited to catching bad guys,” Len replies, a little amused.

“Cisco is probably making a list right now of inappropriate use of super speed,” Barry says and Len can hear the smile in his voice. “He’s convinced I cheat during videogames.”

It’s said in a way that Len’s convinced there’s actual cheating involved and it’s rather amusing to know that Central City’s superhero spends his days beating his friends at videogames with super speed.

“As wonderful as it is to know Ramon is a righteous sore loser, you never answered the question.”

“You were serious?” Barry asks, surprise evident in his voice. “About dinner I mean. And well the other stuff. But why would you… We’re kind of on opposite sides of the law and all. And it’s just… Is this a joke, because I swear if this is a joke I’ll-”

“It’s not a joke,” Len interrupts. “Sure you’re a goody two-shoes, but I bet you go through so many shoes at least one pair has got to be a little bad.”

“That was horrible, even for you.”

“That wasn’t a no, Scarlet.”

Barry’s quiet for what feels like ages, but what Len’s internal clock tells him is 47 seconds. He’s about to tell him to forget it when Barry stumbles out an answer.

“Okay, fine. But I eat a lot and you’re paying for everything.”

The line goes dead after that and Lisa is full on grinning at him. She might plan on pestering him for months and Mick is most likely going to be doing the same thing, but Len strangely does not care. In fact he’s pretty sure the smile on his face is there to stay.


End file.
